sully
sul·ly/ˈsʌli/verb
sully is spelled S-U-L-L-Y: 5 letters and 2 syllables (sul·ly). It appears 1.3 times per million words in written English, the 25,070th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a verb, sully means “To soil or stain; to dirty” (English Wiktionary, September 2026).
How many letters and syllables are in sully?
| Letters | 5: S-U-L-L-Y |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 2: sul·ly |
| In writing | 1.3 times per million words; the 25,070th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
| Rhymes with |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.
How common is sully?
Sully appears 1.3 times per million words in written English, the 25,070th most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How do you pronounce sully?
- US /ˈsʌli/
Sully has 2 syllables, split sul·ly in writing.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-sully.ogg, En-au-sully.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
What rhymes with sully?
One word on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as sully from its last stressed vowel (/ʌli/):
Computed by PlainSpell from the pronunciations in the English Wiktionary (dump of September 2, 2026): a rhyme shares every sound from the last stressed vowel to the end; ordered by written frequency (wordfreq 3.1).
Forms of sully
- sullies present, singular, he/she/it
- sullying participle, present
- sullied participle, past
- sullow
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does sully mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
verb
- 1
To soil or stain; to dirty.
He did not wish to sully his hands with gardening.
- 2
To corrupt or damage.
She tried to sully her rival’s reputation with a suggestive comment.
- 3
To become soiled or tarnished.
noun
- 1
obsoleterareA blemish.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Sully in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | salir, souiller |
| German | besudeln, schmutzig machen |
| Portuguese | sujar , manchar, macular |
| Spanish | mancillar, macular, embarrar, enfangar, enlodar, empañar |
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does sully come from?
From Middle English sulen, sulien (“to become dirty; to defile, pollute, taint”), from Old English sylian (“to soil, pollute; to sully”), from Proto-West Germanic *sulwōn, *sulwijan (“to make dirty; to sully”), from Proto-Indo-European *sūl- (“thick liquid, muck”), perhaps conflated partially with Old French souillier (“to soil”) (modern French souiller) from the same Germanic source. The word is cognate with Danish søle (“to sully”), West Flemish seulewen (“to sully”) (Middle Dutch soluwen (“to sully”)), German sühlen (“to sully”), Old Saxon sulian (“to sully”), Swedish söla (“to sully”).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).